


The Time Neal Pooped His Pants

by Fedora Of Adorableness (TheTimelessChild0)



Category: White Collar
Genre: Caring Reese Hughes, Embarrassment, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Exactly What It Says on the Tin, Fluff, Friendship, Humor, Parental Peter Burke, Soiling, fart jokes, in a nutshell, poop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-17
Updated: 2021-01-17
Packaged: 2021-03-15 18:46:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28818012
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheTimelessChild0/pseuds/Fedora%20Of%20Adorableness
Comments: 1
Kudos: 4





	The Time Neal Pooped His Pants

It was quiet. Well, relatively quiet. Hughes was speaking, but Neal usually tuned that out after the first 20 mins. This time however, the reduction of one type of sensory input, gave way to another entirely. Namely, his gut. Except his was not built merely to detect bad guys, like Agent Burke’s. The con man’s colon was concerned only with what is usually there, inside of him. In this case, his lunch. More accurately, yesterday’s lunch.

And it was more than ready to clear out some space for _today’s_ lunch! There was only problem. He was currently in a conference room...surrounded by FBI agents. It wasn’t like he could sneak out. He barely trusted himself to be able to lift his rear an inch from his seat without farting. If anything would get Hughes’ attention that would, without a shred of doubt.

He resolved to try and hold it through the meeting. He folded his hands on the table.

* * * * * *

_Never mind_. No amount of distraction could defeat the overwhelming pressure in his lower excretory areas. At this point, Neal is looking down to cover his face, which he is sure is sweating by now.

Peter looked over at his CI, who was hunched over awkwardly, knuckles tight as a knot. 

“You ok?” he whispered, concerned.

  
By some miracle, Neal did not blush at this inquiry. He shook his head. “I’ll be fine,” he added hurriedly.

And he believed this. For about five seconds. He was about to make a noise at the cramping, when he instead elected to lift himself up, intently convinced there was no gas. Which was correct. There was something much worse. Before he could even consider sitting back down with any form of _urgency_ , the same noun came into play when all barriers broke down. From the depth of the sarlacc pit, a brown snake emerged, landing in his pants. Caffrey blinked. _Did that seriously just happen?_ As he slowly sat back down, the truth was clear. He shut his eyes in shame. Now, the notorious Neal Caffrey, convicted of bond forgery and _supposedly_ guilty of plenty else, was now definitively guilty of shitting his pants in a conference room, in front of FBI agents.

Burke sniffed the air in surprise. Ensuring that the stench didn’t originate from _him_ , it soon dawned on him exactly who it was. And why.

“Who cut the cheese?” Reese wondered, noticing it also.

Grabbing his phone before too many people could sniff out the culprit, Peter sent a quick text to his boss: ‘ _We’ve got a situation_ ’. When the ASAC looked at the sender, Peter nodded at Neal, a serious and sympathetic look on his face.

“Oh, who cares, who smelt it dealt it...we’ll be going 'round in circles. Let’s just take 5 while we air out the room,” Hughes suddenly lamented to his employees.

Neal still wasn’t looking at anyone else. He didn’t want to know how many of his fellow agents truly knew what had happened. The guarantee that surrounded Peter’s awareness of this, was more than _bad_ enough.

Once everyone else had finally filed out of the room, Caffrey was still sitting there with his head in his hands. The Suit thought he saw a hint of red in the younger man’s cheeks, but it didn’t matter. He put a hand on his shoulder.

“It’s okay, Neal. These things happen. Let’s just get you out of this _uncomfortable_ chair, and clean everything up, alright?” he suggested, stroking his back.

Neal nodded and stood up, wiping a tear out of his right eye. Somehow, the feeling of his soiled slacks tripled as he moved. He winced.

Peter kept his hand on his friend as they too left the conference room. “You’ll be fine,” the agent attempted to reassure, with limited success.

Caffrey was heading towards the stairs, when he was steered to the right instead. 

“Come here, we’ll use the restroom by Hughes’ office,” Burke beckoned.

Neal shook his head nervously. 

“He won’t mind, he understands,” 

The con man swallowed. That was the problem. He didn’t want to draw any more attention to this than absolutely necessary, and borrowing the man’s bathroom for _this_...was out of the question.

“Neal.” Peter turned on his serious voice. He followed his handler diligently, tilting his hat to hide himself when they passed by Reese. 

“Caffrey!” 

The pair turned at the call. “Cowboy up,” the ASAC instructed. 

“Yes sir,” Neal obliged, momentarily struck by the words used.

* * *

  
Peter patted Neal in the back again, as he entered the single men’s room. 

“I’ll fetch you a change of clothes...take as much time as you need,” he encouraged.

“Thanks,” the pitiful pet convict replied quietly.

He got to work, starting with evacuating any remaining waste matter from his innards, then scrubbing himself down, with immense care for cleanliness. Thorough, not missing a single spot. At last, he polished off the rest of his tank, taking a quick leak...flushing the toilet and washing his hands. 

When Burke returned, his clothes were already bundled together, and the damage had been dealt with, put where it truly belonged in the first place.

It was a time like this, that made Neal very grateful that they had lockers with spare clothes; for when a case had them working overnight or in a heatwave drowning their top halves in sweat. Caffrey privately appreciated the underwear aspect, in the moderately unlikely scenario that might lead to a skidmark in his usual pair. This, of course, was considerably more severe of a circumstance.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Peter had retrieved an additional plastic bag from a cabinet in the break area, for Neal to put his laundry. The CI did a clever thing, which was to spray some of his perfume on the contents, before tying it up, thus minimising the smell. He had already given himself the same treatment- given the impact of the ordeal on various pores and glands in his neck region.

The Suit had the brilliant idea of letting his friend hide the incriminating pile of _extraordinary_ evidence behind his work bag as they walked past various gawking coworkers. Neal took the initiative to start a deceptive conversation.

“Does El know you’ve been letting Satchmo eat her quiches?” he brought up.

“No, are you crazy, she’d kill me” Peter gulped.

“And you call me overly dramatic. I don’t get it, you’ve got a shorthand for saying _I love you_ to each other, why are you so certain she won’t understand?” Neal reasoned.

“Because after the Powell case, I had a date night with her as Tannenbaum and she still made me do the dishes…” he informed him.

“Maybe it has something to do with the dry cleaning, or the fact you don’t iron your shirts...or your ties. Has she threatened to throw any of them out yet?” Neal asked with exaggerated hopefulness.

Burke glared at him. “I don’t think they’re looking at us anymore” he remarked.

“Right,”

“I’ll take care of that for you, get back to work,” Peter offered easily, shaking Caffrey’s shoulder and unceremoniously shoving him back towards his desk.

A single signal with his fingers whisked the rest of the stinging in his heart away. To anyone else it probably meant ‘ _Don’t try anything. I’m watching you.’_ To Neal it said something much simpler and so much sweeter; 

_Don’t worry. I’m looking out for you._

**The End.**


End file.
